When I moved to Vermont nearly 30 years ago, I heard what I thought were fables about poor people were genuinely pissed that their kids had to go to school. Those people didn't want their children learning anything because then their kids would be better than the parents. Turned out those weren't fables. I have heard from teachers and administrators about first-hand encounters with enraged parents who were fearful that their kids would end up with better-paying jobs and end up "putting on airs" because the kids learned to read and write.
In this, Vermont is kind of a bellwether of much of the rest of rural America. There has been a slow but steady sea change in the hinterlands, one that has taken us from each generation working hard to ensure then next generation has a better life and DOESN'T have to work as hard, to one that's much more of a crab-bucket mentality. No one escapes rural poverty because they will not let their kids have a better life.
A few months ago, I was in the wilds of South Carolina. One of the men I was working with started complaining about how "the kids today have it so easy." I said "Isn't that kind of the point? Making it easier for your kids to succeed?"
"No!" he said. He was adamant that his kids had to struggle at least as much as he did because struggle builds character. The fact that the deck is already stacked against his kids doesn't matter. And eventually it came out that what he really wanted was for his kids to be blue-collar working stiffs or (for his daughter) maybe a secretary or clerk before becoming a brood mare. In other words, he wanted his kids to be no better off than he was.
I think that you may be overestimating the knowledge (and maybe the intelligence) of the American people. I think that most (white, at least) Americans really do believe that these countries in places like Europe, for instance are indeed hell holes and we have it much better here. At least that is what I see from FB friends living here in the buttlands with me, and ones I know personally outside of social media. And let's not forget the GDNYT, just recently started a story telling us that the US medical system is the best in the world.
This is excellent Roy, and I think about this kind of thing ALL THE TIME. The class aspect (kids getting too big for their britches, etc. etc.) is important, but I think the viewpoint of many Trump voters is even darker. We look at the MAGAts and think, “don’t they know they’re getting screwed too, that he doesn’t give a shit about them? They must be stupid.” But I think they DO know. I think their support for Trump comes from a place of really deep cynicism and despair. They know deep down he won’t make their lives better, but so long as he hurts the people they perceive as being more successful and happier than they are, they don’t care. They don’t believe any politician will help them, so it’s all about redirecting the most pain onto their enemies. It’s why so much of Trump support boils down to “LOL, librul tears.”
When the New York Times or the Washington Post reporters descend on the diners and ask them about it, they dress it up and talk about Trump’s “policies” but I think it boils down to “I’m fucked (or think I am) so I want you to be fucked too, and harder.”
The prominence in the U.S. of a kind of evangelical Christianity which is so fervently, maniacally authoritarian has to be part of it. Sure on one level it's supposed to be about Jesus of Nazareth, but in practice so much of it really is the Gospel of Supply Side Jesus, Jesus God of War and Hellfire, Jesus who doesn't want to hear any of this liberal crap about "social justice" because the only thing that matters is who's In and who's Out when He comes to get you. Jesus doesn't want to hear you complaining about the CEO because once that kind of backtalk is allowed, next thing you know you'll be complaining about your daddy, or the pastor, or God Himself. And then you'll be letting the drag queens tell stories to your children, and with that all hope is lost for your soul and your children's souls.
I have a similar obsession. So these days I'm ghostwriting the memoir of a young woman who grew up in Roy's Fritters, Alabama, in a trailer, in a town with half the population of my high school. She came to NYC, got into a good profession, won international awards, AND is in therapy. I keep praising her for that, and keep telling her it's as much an accomplishment as anything, given her past. She tells me that, back home, you're not even allowed to mention "the T word." Because to even think about therapy is to show weakness. "You should be able to solve those problems yourself."
This, to me, is the "pride" of a prisoner in jail who is proud he doesn't have to make his own meals.
I've also wondered, every one of the thousands of times I've been to a supermarket and stood next to the tabloids, why ordinary and/or poor people want to read about Jennifer Aniston or Oprah and Steadman--i.e., why they want to rub their own noses in the glossy privilege of others. Then again, maybe it's only masochistic if you lack self-awareness.
I think there's an element of guilt, too, that turns into something so corrosive from the tension of the demand that we think of ourselves as the light of the world, the new beginning, the fresh start in the New World, the Shining City, etc., versus the knowledge (however rudimentary) that we are in most ways like any other country on earth: we didn't magically appear on a new continent, pure in heart and deed, we invaded, we fought and killed and committed genocide and inflicted suffering on enslaved peoples we dragged here. That is, our history is as blood-soaked and violent as the history of any other human endeavor on earth.
We don't want to know that, but we are a young enough country that it takes genuine effort to NOT know it - we have written history and recorded testimony. Unlike, say, Russia, where Putin can retool a thousand year history to meet his own mythicized vision, we're younger and we have receipts.
When it's pointed out, people try and mostly fail with mythology, and end up with arguments like "What are we supposed to do? Leave the country? Give it back?", or try to mix it up with how it wasn't our fault, today, that Europeans brought their illnesses and their pig vectors, and 90% of our potential future neighbors died, or even that Africans were "immigrants".
Our history is knowable but there's such a compulsion to not know and the tension is destroying us. Sometimes I just want to say, "Look, our history is bloody and violent, welcome to humanity, and guess what, it doesn't have to be like that forever. Let's start today." But that would involve decapitating the interests of the wealthy power-holders who benefit so much from the "let's watch you and them fight" strategy.
It used to be the American lore that this nation of immigrants, excepting, of course Native Americans, was made up of people who came here to better themselves and were willing to take a chance, as opposed to the supposedly passive people they left behind.
But, while that has been true for many, even most immigrants and their dependents, the country also developed a culture of individualism, racism, religious intolerance and a distinct lack of solidarity except in times of desperate crisis. Alexis de Tocqueville in his landmark "Democracy in America" was one of the first to notice this in the 1830s.
It may well be that, because the nation does not have a shared racial and ethnic culture, it is harder to easily develop a sense of cross-class solidarity. Instead, our "culture" seems to be laissez-faire enterprise and individualism, which easily lends itself to corruption, social manipulation and other criminality and an authoritarian sense of f*ck you I've got mine. Fortunately, most people resist the worst aspects of this "culture" but the large number who identify as "conservative" certainly do.
The laissez-faire/screw you culture also consistently undermines democratic norms. That's the real danger of the GOP and the orange monster in the White House.
"And their supporters persist in letting them. Why?"
Also, too, this country produces people who *enjoy* being cruel and mean. As you describe it's just a built in part of the American culture. Performative cruelty for fun and sport. We're a serial killer nation.
I wish I could agree with this, but I think the truth is simpler: Trump is a damaged personality, the Republican officeholders care only for power and money, and their followers have been trained for 20 years to hate, and they enjoy it. That's about it, for me.
Since I don't have a clue why people are the way they are (or even why I am the way I am), I turn to science for an explanation or at least a hint. To that end, may I suggest some sources I've found enlightening: "The Criminal Personality" by Yochelson and Samerow, a three volume report of what they found working with criminals incarcerated at St. Elizabeth's Hospital. "The Authoritarians," Bob Altemeyer's summary of his decades of researching the right wing authoritarian personality. "Thinking Fast and Slow," Daniel Kahneman's popularization of the extensive research into how our conscious and subconscious minds work. Any of several works popularizing the methods of probability and statistics, e.g., Nate Silver's "The Signal and the Noise" or Charles Whelan's "Naked Statistics." Finally, for an example of how a problem can be tackled through the most basic of scientific methods, I suggest "The City" by William H. Whyte, wherein through interviews and filming, Whyte and his associates determined which public spaces in NYC are popular and why.
I have used what I've learned from each of these in many aspects of my life, including career, community and volunteering. Sometimes successfully. But always better than if I just assumed I knew what to do.
Status is, for some people, the most valuable 'good' in the economists' sense, and the degradation of others is for a subset of them the best proof.
Others, I think, just have had what I consider an horrible, horrible, moral system inculcated into them. It's the sheer tenacity and resistance to argument and practical necessity that makes me think that it's a matter of sincere belief.
This is excellent Roy. But t'was not always thus. The union movement responsible for creating America's middle class was a collective effort that succeeded as much or even more than their European counterparts of the time, right up until the 60's and Civil Rights destroyed the white solidarity that empowered it. Ironically, it was the success of unions that gave white American workers the luxury to become dittoheads, Fox viewers, and such willing tools for their capitalist overlords.
The scumbags in charge are revealing themselves to be as villainous as we've always suspected, but, as Roy and everyone here has attempted to explain, the mystery is always why Americans support them. Racism, religion, xenophobia, sheer ignorance -- as Ellis Weiner says above, this topic is just too yooje. One anecdotal bit: In the working class half of my life, I'd occasionally point out to my colleagues some tidbit like how the average American worker toiled for 350 hours more per year than their German counterpart -- over two months of 40-hour weeks. Invariably, people I told this to either A. refused to believe it, or B. expressed their religious faith in American capitalism which just had to be better, or C. simply didn't allow the information to even enter their minds, as if I had told them Jesus was Jewish or something. They just didn't want to know.
If I really wanted to upset them, I'd show them just how much a billion dollars is.
When I moved to Vermont nearly 30 years ago, I heard what I thought were fables about poor people were genuinely pissed that their kids had to go to school. Those people didn't want their children learning anything because then their kids would be better than the parents. Turned out those weren't fables. I have heard from teachers and administrators about first-hand encounters with enraged parents who were fearful that their kids would end up with better-paying jobs and end up "putting on airs" because the kids learned to read and write.
In this, Vermont is kind of a bellwether of much of the rest of rural America. There has been a slow but steady sea change in the hinterlands, one that has taken us from each generation working hard to ensure then next generation has a better life and DOESN'T have to work as hard, to one that's much more of a crab-bucket mentality. No one escapes rural poverty because they will not let their kids have a better life.
A few months ago, I was in the wilds of South Carolina. One of the men I was working with started complaining about how "the kids today have it so easy." I said "Isn't that kind of the point? Making it easier for your kids to succeed?"
"No!" he said. He was adamant that his kids had to struggle at least as much as he did because struggle builds character. The fact that the deck is already stacked against his kids doesn't matter. And eventually it came out that what he really wanted was for his kids to be blue-collar working stiffs or (for his daughter) maybe a secretary or clerk before becoming a brood mare. In other words, he wanted his kids to be no better off than he was.
I think that you may be overestimating the knowledge (and maybe the intelligence) of the American people. I think that most (white, at least) Americans really do believe that these countries in places like Europe, for instance are indeed hell holes and we have it much better here. At least that is what I see from FB friends living here in the buttlands with me, and ones I know personally outside of social media. And let's not forget the GDNYT, just recently started a story telling us that the US medical system is the best in the world.
This is excellent Roy, and I think about this kind of thing ALL THE TIME. The class aspect (kids getting too big for their britches, etc. etc.) is important, but I think the viewpoint of many Trump voters is even darker. We look at the MAGAts and think, “don’t they know they’re getting screwed too, that he doesn’t give a shit about them? They must be stupid.” But I think they DO know. I think their support for Trump comes from a place of really deep cynicism and despair. They know deep down he won’t make their lives better, but so long as he hurts the people they perceive as being more successful and happier than they are, they don’t care. They don’t believe any politician will help them, so it’s all about redirecting the most pain onto their enemies. It’s why so much of Trump support boils down to “LOL, librul tears.”
When the New York Times or the Washington Post reporters descend on the diners and ask them about it, they dress it up and talk about Trump’s “policies” but I think it boils down to “I’m fucked (or think I am) so I want you to be fucked too, and harder.”
The prominence in the U.S. of a kind of evangelical Christianity which is so fervently, maniacally authoritarian has to be part of it. Sure on one level it's supposed to be about Jesus of Nazareth, but in practice so much of it really is the Gospel of Supply Side Jesus, Jesus God of War and Hellfire, Jesus who doesn't want to hear any of this liberal crap about "social justice" because the only thing that matters is who's In and who's Out when He comes to get you. Jesus doesn't want to hear you complaining about the CEO because once that kind of backtalk is allowed, next thing you know you'll be complaining about your daddy, or the pastor, or God Himself. And then you'll be letting the drag queens tell stories to your children, and with that all hope is lost for your soul and your children's souls.
I have a similar obsession. So these days I'm ghostwriting the memoir of a young woman who grew up in Roy's Fritters, Alabama, in a trailer, in a town with half the population of my high school. She came to NYC, got into a good profession, won international awards, AND is in therapy. I keep praising her for that, and keep telling her it's as much an accomplishment as anything, given her past. She tells me that, back home, you're not even allowed to mention "the T word." Because to even think about therapy is to show weakness. "You should be able to solve those problems yourself."
This, to me, is the "pride" of a prisoner in jail who is proud he doesn't have to make his own meals.
I've also wondered, every one of the thousands of times I've been to a supermarket and stood next to the tabloids, why ordinary and/or poor people want to read about Jennifer Aniston or Oprah and Steadman--i.e., why they want to rub their own noses in the glossy privilege of others. Then again, maybe it's only masochistic if you lack self-awareness.
This is a yooje topic. I could go on.
Please make this column public, Roy.
I think there's an element of guilt, too, that turns into something so corrosive from the tension of the demand that we think of ourselves as the light of the world, the new beginning, the fresh start in the New World, the Shining City, etc., versus the knowledge (however rudimentary) that we are in most ways like any other country on earth: we didn't magically appear on a new continent, pure in heart and deed, we invaded, we fought and killed and committed genocide and inflicted suffering on enslaved peoples we dragged here. That is, our history is as blood-soaked and violent as the history of any other human endeavor on earth.
We don't want to know that, but we are a young enough country that it takes genuine effort to NOT know it - we have written history and recorded testimony. Unlike, say, Russia, where Putin can retool a thousand year history to meet his own mythicized vision, we're younger and we have receipts.
When it's pointed out, people try and mostly fail with mythology, and end up with arguments like "What are we supposed to do? Leave the country? Give it back?", or try to mix it up with how it wasn't our fault, today, that Europeans brought their illnesses and their pig vectors, and 90% of our potential future neighbors died, or even that Africans were "immigrants".
Our history is knowable but there's such a compulsion to not know and the tension is destroying us. Sometimes I just want to say, "Look, our history is bloody and violent, welcome to humanity, and guess what, it doesn't have to be like that forever. Let's start today." But that would involve decapitating the interests of the wealthy power-holders who benefit so much from the "let's watch you and them fight" strategy.
It used to be the American lore that this nation of immigrants, excepting, of course Native Americans, was made up of people who came here to better themselves and were willing to take a chance, as opposed to the supposedly passive people they left behind.
But, while that has been true for many, even most immigrants and their dependents, the country also developed a culture of individualism, racism, religious intolerance and a distinct lack of solidarity except in times of desperate crisis. Alexis de Tocqueville in his landmark "Democracy in America" was one of the first to notice this in the 1830s.
It may well be that, because the nation does not have a shared racial and ethnic culture, it is harder to easily develop a sense of cross-class solidarity. Instead, our "culture" seems to be laissez-faire enterprise and individualism, which easily lends itself to corruption, social manipulation and other criminality and an authoritarian sense of f*ck you I've got mine. Fortunately, most people resist the worst aspects of this "culture" but the large number who identify as "conservative" certainly do.
The laissez-faire/screw you culture also consistently undermines democratic norms. That's the real danger of the GOP and the orange monster in the White House.
"And their supporters persist in letting them. Why?"
Also, too, this country produces people who *enjoy* being cruel and mean. As you describe it's just a built in part of the American culture. Performative cruelty for fun and sport. We're a serial killer nation.
I wish I could agree with this, but I think the truth is simpler: Trump is a damaged personality, the Republican officeholders care only for power and money, and their followers have been trained for 20 years to hate, and they enjoy it. That's about it, for me.
Since I don't have a clue why people are the way they are (or even why I am the way I am), I turn to science for an explanation or at least a hint. To that end, may I suggest some sources I've found enlightening: "The Criminal Personality" by Yochelson and Samerow, a three volume report of what they found working with criminals incarcerated at St. Elizabeth's Hospital. "The Authoritarians," Bob Altemeyer's summary of his decades of researching the right wing authoritarian personality. "Thinking Fast and Slow," Daniel Kahneman's popularization of the extensive research into how our conscious and subconscious minds work. Any of several works popularizing the methods of probability and statistics, e.g., Nate Silver's "The Signal and the Noise" or Charles Whelan's "Naked Statistics." Finally, for an example of how a problem can be tackled through the most basic of scientific methods, I suggest "The City" by William H. Whyte, wherein through interviews and filming, Whyte and his associates determined which public spaces in NYC are popular and why.
I have used what I've learned from each of these in many aspects of my life, including career, community and volunteering. Sometimes successfully. But always better than if I just assumed I knew what to do.
Status is, for some people, the most valuable 'good' in the economists' sense, and the degradation of others is for a subset of them the best proof.
Others, I think, just have had what I consider an horrible, horrible, moral system inculcated into them. It's the sheer tenacity and resistance to argument and practical necessity that makes me think that it's a matter of sincere belief.
A sad perspective Roy but the right one. (RIP Sanders 2020!) is just as sad.
This is excellent Roy. But t'was not always thus. The union movement responsible for creating America's middle class was a collective effort that succeeded as much or even more than their European counterparts of the time, right up until the 60's and Civil Rights destroyed the white solidarity that empowered it. Ironically, it was the success of unions that gave white American workers the luxury to become dittoheads, Fox viewers, and such willing tools for their capitalist overlords.
The scumbags in charge are revealing themselves to be as villainous as we've always suspected, but, as Roy and everyone here has attempted to explain, the mystery is always why Americans support them. Racism, religion, xenophobia, sheer ignorance -- as Ellis Weiner says above, this topic is just too yooje. One anecdotal bit: In the working class half of my life, I'd occasionally point out to my colleagues some tidbit like how the average American worker toiled for 350 hours more per year than their German counterpart -- over two months of 40-hour weeks. Invariably, people I told this to either A. refused to believe it, or B. expressed their religious faith in American capitalism which just had to be better, or C. simply didn't allow the information to even enter their minds, as if I had told them Jesus was Jewish or something. They just didn't want to know.
If I really wanted to upset them, I'd show them just how much a billion dollars is.
Anyone's opinion of Jonathan Haidt's work, ignoring (for the moment) his side-business of hating liberal academics?
Anyone's opinion of Jonathan Haidt's work, ignoring (for the moment) his side-business of hating liberal academics?